


Swan Song

by AnotherNamelessGhoul



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Aging, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Soft Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:55:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22870591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnotherNamelessGhoul/pseuds/AnotherNamelessGhoul
Summary: Jaskier is getting older and Geralt is staying the same. One shot.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 6
Kudos: 196





	Swan Song

From across the campfire, Jaskier could see the glint of Geralt's yellow eyes catching the fire's light as the Witcher stared at him. It wasn't exactly unusual, for Geralt to sit in silence and watch him like that, like he was drinking in every feature and detail and flaw of his face, the curve of his lips, the dip of his nose, the swoop of his jawline. 

"Something on your mind?" Jaskier asked, stretching out his tired bones in the warmth, feeling the cracks and pops of his joints as he worked out the stiffness of the day. He could see Geralt working out whatever it was he wanted to say, turning it over and over in his head like the words wouldn't quite fit together. He prodded at the fire with the end of a stick as a way to buy time.

"You've been slowing down." He said, and finally dragged his eyes off of Jaskier. "For a while." 

They had been stopping more frequently in the past weeks, months. More breaks for food or water or to lean up again a particularly soft hill and bathe in the sunshine for a bit. Geralt had suffered Jaskier's little respites without much in the way of complaint, just the occasional gentle grousing. Jaskier nodded.

"Are you... hurt? Somewhere?"

Jaskier laughed gently. "I'm alright. I'm getting old, Geralt. Things are getting stiff that once were limber. Something always aches. But no, I'm not hurt." He stretched out his back as if to punctuate the point, winced at the tightness across the middle of it. Silent as a shadow, Geralt slipped behind him, took Jaskier's shoulders and dug his warm fingertips into the tightness. Jaskier melted back into the touch with a happy little sigh.

"Old," Geralt said, and then there was a silence as the realization dawned on him, as if he'd forgotten how humans aged, as if he'd spent so much time around witchers and sorceresses that he'd forgotten normal biological process. He'd had to have noticed the grey in his beard and hair, Jaskier thought, the wrinkles around his eyes and lips, the way it took him longer to rise in the mornings. 

"It's all downhill from here, friend," he said, smiling to show that he was mostly joking. "The human form is a cruel mistress. Or master, as it were."

Geralt was still silent, staring into the fire like an answer would lick up from the flames. 

"You know, we could settle down somewhere," Jaskier prodded. This seemed as good a time as any to bring up what was on his mind. "Somewhere warm, maybe. And quiet. No damn monsters for once." 

The silence was getting to be too deafening when Geralt finally spoke again. "I'm not meant to be in one place, Jaskier. I can't retire. I'll be done my work when something takes my life in the field."

"Don't give me any of that 'a witcher doesn't die in his bed' nonsense, Geralt. I'm not asking you to retire. I'm asking you to settle down for a handful of years and then go on without me after. I don't expect you to sit around twiddling your thumbs when I'm gone." Jaskier had thought about it a lot. Maybe dying under some fang or claw was what Geralt was destined for, but he wanted to slip away warm and calm and preferably held by Geralt and Ciri. It was a thought.

Geralt's voice broke, just a little, but he never would have admitted to it. "Much more than a handful."

"If we're lucky." Geralt worked his fingers into a particularly tight spot and Jaskier almost purred out the words as his body went limp. Geralt smirked, just a bit. 

"That is, Jaskier continued," if you'll still have me. When I'm old and grey. I understand that I can be a bit... insufferable, and once my looks are gone, what is there?" He was joking, eyes sparkling, but Geralt appraised him very seriously, then kissed him, missing from the odd angling and catching him at the corner of his mouth. 

"I will have you now and until your last day. You ought to know that by now." He snuggled Jaskier closer to him, into his broad chest. "I don't know if I know how to settle."

"I don't either. I've spent how many decades all over the world with you? We could learn together."

"Hm. We could."

"Don't worry just yet. I've still gotna few adventures left in these old bones." And then he turned and kissed the frown from Geralt's face, and all was right for a moment.


End file.
